Black male attention = fat ass
by Carmen Van Kerckhove
Oh good lord. More race stuff from Postsecret (remember this one we discussed awhile back?).
Hat tip to Sewere. Check out his post on Rachel’s Tavern about it.
Trackbacks & Pings
Comments
-
Not SUrprising at all. There’s a reason I’m wary of most white girls. beneath the surface, most of them have similar, if not worse opinions about not just black men, but all men of color.
-
Not to put white women on the spot, but what exactly is wrong with having a fat ass?
-
Do we even know that this postcard was written by a white woman? I assumed that racialicious readers would be less likely to make blanket statements about a racial group, but that certainly does not seem to be the case (ahem…Lloyd Webber)
-
How do we know this was a white woman?
-
I have one and my jeans look better!!
-
Although I should admit that was my initial assumption too.
-
I had to think about it, too. I learn toward it being a white woman. (BTW–not white girls Lloyd–white women. if you are looking at white girls, I may need to call Dateline NBC, but white women that’s a different story
) -
Ike says, “Not to put white women on the spot, but what exactly is wrong with having a fat ass?”
Nothing, LOL!!
-
Well, the specific usage of the phrase “black man” seems to imply that this person views themself as being neither male nor black, hence the need to create a labeled otherness. Additionally, the largest words on the page, the ones that are the source of focus for the author are “fat ass.” This postcard is primarily about the writer’s issues with a specific area of her body, but her attitudes are linked with race and racial stereotypes.
The author seems to believe that she can’t hold any other attraction for a black man than her ass. While this is a denigration of the author (how can the ONLY thing that makes her attractive to another person be one part of her body?? Humans don’t work that way. One part may be fetishized, but attraction and fixation are two different things), it’s a big insult to black men generally. The implication that black men as a rule have no interest in any other aspect of a woman besides her body is a pervasive and dangerous attitude in pop culture today, and one that I think has been glorified for far too long.
Certainly it may be said that this person was operating on a very superficial level when penning this card. Then again, when someone is unnaturally focused on one aspect of their external appearance as the sole measure of their worth, they’re clearly not going to be operating on a level beyond the surface. In other words, they’re comparing their “insides”–i.e. how they feel about themselves– to other people’s “outside.”
-
Why assume the women doesn’t like her “fat ass”?
Why assume the women doesn’t like black men?
-
Ike-Nothing is wrong with having one, unless you just don’t want one. Not everyone likes to be fat or have a fat body part. LM, I guess we can assume she doesn’t like it because she is “worried” about it.
-
Do we know this is not some kind of troll?
And yeah, what is wrong with having a fat ass? Mine makes even the hardest office chair nice and cushy.
Perhaps I am lucky to have escaped the conditioning most women get in our society, but I’ve always assumed that men flirt with me because of my sparkling personality and wit.
I would hope. It certainly is dehumanizing to think that black men (or any other men) only see a woman as her body parts. -
I meant women obviously, but then again, I’m kinda young myself, not even legally an adult.
-
I don’t even know how this relates but…
out of all my past lovers, the white ones loved my ass the most.And my juicy booty comes from my Bohemian grandmother & not my Black father. Peace!
~F -
Frances, guess what - I have a Bohemian grandma from whom I inherited my considerable booty, too!
Plenty of white women of Mediterranean and Slavic descent are bootylicious - after all, once upon a time, dainty delicate women could hardly be expected to survive fieldwork and constant childbearing. -
Forgive me. It was not at all my intention to imply that there’s anything wrong with having a “fat ass.” I happen to love mine.
That being said, the word “fat” in our society is usually derogatory, and the phrase “fat ass” isn’t often applied lovingly, so with that in mind, I felt it reasonably safe to assume the postcard’s author was coming from that perspective. Furthermore, as another poster pointed out, if the ass in question (LOL at my own phrase) is a source of worry on any occasion, it’s probably also safe to guess that said ass isn’t entirely appreciated and loved by its wearer the way it ought to be.
I also did not mean to imply that the author of the postcard doesn’t like black men. To get technical, and perhaps stray too far into the philosophy of language, I simply observed that the choice of words and the construction of the phrase– “a black man”–implies that the writer, by default, perceives herself as being distinct/apart/other/separate from/not that (idea/concept/linguistic object/philosophical construct) which is a “a black man.”
The primary point I was trying to make earlier is that the postcard’s author seems to be saying that she’s worried she holds no attraction whatsoever for men of color other than her rear end– it seems to me, IMHO, that her issue is primarily with herself & her body, with a side dish of racial stereotyping added to the mix.
I think it’s entirely possible, and even likely, that this belief could be disappointing for her; maybe she wants to have more than just the brief exchange of a flirtation with the black men that she meets, but either
a) doesn’t value herself enough to believe from the outset that the attraction could very well be to her sparkling personality and sense of humor– with a beautiful figure as a fringe benefit, or
b) is perhaps uncomfortable with black male sexuality in general in spite of herself, and needs to retreat to the safety blanket of a stereotype to resolve conflicting, possibly overwhelming feelings with as little self-examination as possible.
Her statement is brief, and therefore ambiguous, and I think it bears saying that none of us can really know the details & complexities of the particular neuroses informing the author’s brief and, frankly, incendiary turn of phrase. But we’re all taking turns to comment and speculate about it. I just want to offer my take, for what it’s worth.
-
It’s a weird statement and I still don’t know what it means, even after reading thoughtful comments here about it. My first reflex was to think it meant “I am a person who thinks all black men love big asses on women [however you define bigness in relation to asses] and so when black men flirt with me, I read that as an indicator that I have a big ass.” With some false-self-effacement thrown in by way of framing her reaction as “worry” rather than the fact that she went out of her way to announce that men flirt with her. Although I may be a big ass of a different sort for seeing that last part in it.
Ike - I am a white woman and I grew up around mostly only white people, and yelling or hissing “fat ass!” at a woman/girl was a way to supposedly really put her down. Occasionally said by teenaged boys, but mostly by girls or women to other girls or women. I don’t know what gives. I don’t think it’s you putting people on the spot, though, to ask. It does seem to me like a specifically white thing.
A coworker got in an argument with a woman in a parking lot last week and when she told me the woman yelled “fat ass!” at her, I was like, ah, so you were dealing with a skinny white woman. (She was.)
Which is a separate issue from stereotyping assumptions about black men, other men of color, women of color and what their bodies are like, etc.
Great blog, by the way.
-
LOL at this whole conversation! Point of clarification: Being called a “fat ass” and being told you have a “fat ass” are two different things.
-
Ailurophile wrote: Plenty of white women of Mediterranean and Slavic descent are bootylicious….
Guess you can add women of Armenian descent to the mix. Brothers seem to love Kim Kardashian’s assets.
-
A said it better than I could have,
Well, the specific usage of the phrase “black man” seems to imply that this person views themself as being neither male nor black, hence the need to create a labeled otherness.
That’s why I’m almost certain it such a statement could not have been made by a black woman…. i.e. the othering phrase “black men.”
FWIW, the only people I’ve heard use the “black men like me because of my ass” phrase have been white women, either as bragging rights to other women or white men OR a distraught call against unwanted attention.
The implication that black men as a rule have no interest in any other aspect of a woman besides her body is a pervasive and dangerous attitude in pop culture today, and one that I think has been glorified for far too long.
Which is why this postcard touched a nerve.
Thanks for all the responses folks, keep em coming.
-
I just thought of another way this statement plays on stereotypes interracial sexual interest. I’m trying hard to imagine black women or any woman who has lived within and can relate to African-American/Black communities, coming up with a statement like this…. but for some reason I can’t.
-
If the woman meant it in a good way, maybe, just a maybe, she would have written PHAT ass?
I think that when Black women refer to their ample behinds in a positive way (if they have one), they use phrases such as, booty, bootay, behind, butt…however, I don’t want to deconstruct the linguistic ways Black women lovingly appreciate their backsides. I just wanted to add to the “the postcard was saying it in a bad way” arguement.
Before I learned what sex was, I knew that the most appealing part of my body was my, ahem, bootay. I learned that from older boys who said things about my body that I didn’t quite understand. I learned it from older women who would look at my bootay and just shake their heads….I must say that, for me, just in my experience, most of the men who appreciated my bootay were Black men. It certaintly helped to balance the other negative messages I got because I didn’t fit into designer jeans. What did not help, however, was that blasted Luke song and that bloody video. That made me cringe and tie sweaters around my waist for months when it came out. It made my stomach turn. I just think it is ironic that the postcard has that (almost) iconic image. Was that image on the postcard, or is that a graphic this website added? Must’ve been on the postcard.
-
I suppose the author of the postcard could also have been a non-white, non-black woman who grew up in a mostly white area where having a “fat ass” is something to “worry” about.
The main problem I have with PostSecret postcards with racist undertones (overtones?) is not that they are felt or even sent in - it’s that they’re “secrets”, meaning that the authors don’t feel as if they have any place to discuss, dissect, and possibly change their racist notions.
I see this mentality a lot in the liberal, politically correct crowd, where people think of racism as “evil” and therefore a taboo subject, which just suppresses it and doesn’t really solve anything.
If I knew how to post an e-mail reply to PostSecret, I would suggest that the author re-evaluate WHY she thinks black men are attracted to large derrieres and/or WHY she finds that part of her body worrisome.
-
Further thoughts to, uh, round out this issue, from Nanette, guest-posting at Feministe.
-
I also took her as white because the phrase “black men” implied “other” to me. But anyway,
FWIW, the only people I’ve heard use the “black men like me because of my ass” phrase have been white women, either as bragging rights to other women or white men …
The bragging rights thing I can understand; in my experience “fat ass” is described as such a bad thing - beyond reason, really, with women lamenting to me about perfectly attractive “fat” butts - that I can see why a woman who’s getting those messages about her butt would want to be able to point to somebody who likes it just fine. That even seems OK to me; it’s perfectly fine for white people to say to other white people that current white beauty standards just might not be universal.
The point where it gets dubious is where the black guy’s interest is reduced to the ass, as if people of other races couldn’t be attracted to the same mix of looks and personality as white people.
-
I agree that this was probably not a black woman for all the reasons mentioned by others above. I also believe that this was more than likely a white woman. However, I do think it is possible that this could be an Asian, Hispanic, or mixed race woman. Personally, the first truly anorexic woman I ever met was Asian, so certainly other folks besides white women buy into the “skinnier the better” mentality that is so prevalent in white culture, and might be self conscious about having an ample butt.
Regardless - “the point where it gets dubious is where the black guy’s interest is reduced to the ass” - agreed. This is definitely an insult to black men.
-
Michelle I agree. The word phat is positive. When was the last time a black person used the term “fat ” as a description of a nice ass. That’s old terminology. I believe the woman is non-black.
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of 
Carl's Jr. celebrates flat buns at Racialicious - the intersection of race and pop culture on 19 Sep 2007 at 7:07 am
[…] Feel free to riff on some of the themes brought up in this earlier conversation. […]